Allowed To
by Hisa-Ai
Summary: "Do you love me?" Arthur asked suddenly, his hand coming up once again, fluttering just in front of Merlin's face, his fingers burning Merlin's skin without even touching him.


For week two of the Merlin Arts Fest. For the three words prompt: Light. Rejuvenated. Romance.

**Disclaimer: **As always, I own nothing.

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_Allowed To_

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"You should get some sleep." Merlin said softly, coming up behind Arthur slowly, looking over his shoulder at the dying fire he had been staring at for some hours now, refusing to let Merlin or any of the knights take watch for the majority of the night.

Merlin knew, without even looking at Arthur's face, that he was deep in thought, that something was plaguing him, that he was… somewhere else. He was here, sitting in front of this fire, but he wasn't quite _there_, not really, not entirely. Something was bothering him, had been bothering him for some days now.

And, Merlin was afraid, it had something to do with _him. _

Arthur hadn't come right out and said anything, of course, but… Merlin could just _tell._

He could tell from the silence that was left between the pair of them so often lately, from the way Arthur would dismiss him much earlier than usual, from the way he would hardly meet Merlin's eye some moments, from the way he hadn't been saying anything… well, _Arthur _like. There'd been no name calling, no insults, nothing that their relationship usually consisted of. Arthur almost seemed to not know what to do with himself whenever he was around Merlin these days. And it left Merlin with a bitter taste in his mouth, with an uncomfortable twisting in his stomach, as he went about with things, treading carefully when he was around Arthur—he thought, maybe, if he just gave him a few days, things might fix themselves somehow—and giving him the space that he could by leaving when he was dismissed and doing little more than his job.

It was a hard few days, naturally, that left Merlin with little idea of what to do with himself, as he usually spent every spare moment with Arthur, but if Arthur didn't want him around… well, it certainly had given him the time to spend with the knights and getting caught up on his chores for Gaius, at any rate.

It was easy enough to give Arthur the space he so clearly needed—_wanted?_—back in Camelot, but, then there had been _this_, this… Patrol to the borders that had been planned some weeks in advanced that Arthur would not reschedule for anything in the world. And of course, it was an overnight sort of journey that left them with little break from one another, the air tense enough between them that Gwaine, even, questioned it once or twice, though he'd quickly been silenced by a quick glare from Arthur.

Even then, Merlin had been careful to give Arthur the space he still so clearly desired, but… Being so close to him, the rift between them that had seemingly appeared overnight… It kept Merlin up, kept him thinking about it, worrying over Arthur and the way he was just sitting in front of the fire, thinking, refusing to get any sort of sleep of his own. Everything was just… coming together in the worst sort of way, adding up in a way that left Merlin with no choice other than to finally give up on sleep and try to grant Arthur a reprieve, to see if he couldn't convince _him_ to try to get some sleep.

Or at least, that's what Merlin told himself, when he pulled himself to his feet and came up behind Arthur. The young king simply needed to get some sleep. That was all.

"I'm fine, Merlin." Arthur said, his voice low and soft and dismissive in a way that made something bristle inside Merlin. "You can go back to sleep."

"I'm not tired." Merlin said without thought, the words falling from his lips against his aching bones and tired muscles.

"You'll need your rest for—"

"As will _you." _Merlin interrupted pointedly, tired with this argument already as he took it upon himself to take the seat next to Arthur. "Go get some sleep, I'll take watch for a while."

"I don't need it." Arthur said, keeping his eyes on the fire as he moved ever so slightly away from Merlin.

"You don't need _sleep?" _Merlin repeated skeptically, cutting his eyes at Arthur, at the distance between them that left him with a displeased sort of feeling spreading through-out his veins.

"No."

"We _all_ need sleep, Arthur—"

"Not me. Not tonight." He interrupted.

"_Fine_." Merlin relented, his tone sharp as he looked from Arthur to the fire when it became clear that Arthur would not see reason, would not do the sensible thing and get the sleep Merlin knew he so clearly needed. "Then I guess neither of us will be getting any sleep. It's almost dawn, at any rate, so at least it won't be just the pair of us for too much long—"

"Merlin, _please_." Arthur sighed, turning from the fire at last to look at Merlin, something lost and almost _broken_ about the way he did when Merlin looked from the fire to him as well. "Just go get some sleep and leave me in peace. _Please."_ He repeated.

Merlin drew his eyebrows together in something like concern and worry, his stomach knotting itself up once again… because 'please'? _Please? _If Merlin hadn't been convinced there was something wrong with Arthur, something not right between the pair of them… well, it was abundantly clear _now._

"I won't." Merlin shook his head, Arthur's face betraying him for a moment as it almost lit up with the usual sort of refusal from Merlin; he didn't want Merlin to go away, not really, not if that _look_ was anything to go by. But he _wanted_ to want Merlin to go away, _wanted_ to want to put space and distance between them. But Merlin wasn't sure… wasn't sure _why. _

"Not until you tell me what's wrong. Have I…" Merlin licked his bottom lip in thought, running it between his teeth for a moment before continuing. "Done something? Are you upset with me? Because lately—"

"It's not… not _you_…" Arthur shook his head, interrupting before Merlin could make sense of things himself. Which meant… he knew what he was doing, knew why he was doing it, had given it some thought… "Well, I mean it _is_ you, but… it's more _me_, Merlin. _I'm_ the one who's done something wrong, not you." Arthur explained, breaking eye contact to look away from Merlin with something unreadable in his eyes.

"What've you done _wrong? _Arthur? Sire?" Merlin asked, ducking his head to try to get Arthur's attention once again.

"Nothing. Just forget about it." He said, still avoiding Merlin's eye.

Merlin rolled his eyes, reached a hand out to guide Arthur's head back up by the chin to look him in the eye. All those days, all that time spent with Arthur all but pushing him away, keeping their relationship cool, almost a proper king and manservant relationship, there was no way Merlin was just going to _forget_ about it, not when he was so close to finding out what was wrong, how he could fix things.

"Just tell me." He mumbled, eyes locking onto Arthur's, no room for argument in his tone.

Arthur shook his head. "I can't, because… This isn't… I'm the _king_, Merlin, I can't—"

"You've been the king for almost a year now, Arthur, what does that—"

"And I've been doing something wrong this _entire_ time. Don't you see?" He mumbled, his voice pleading, distant, low and desperate all at once, a feat only Arthur could seem to manage and master in that particular way.

"No. I don't. Arthur, just—" Merlin made a face of exasperation, shaking his head slightly. Honestly, if he'd wanted to hear riddles and half-answers that weren't _really_ answers, he would have just gone to Kilgharrah, not _Arthur_. "—just tell me. If you tell me, I can _help you. _I can—"

"There's nothing you can do, Merlin. This is all… _me."_ He sighed, closing the distance between the pair of them, calming Merlin against the situation at hand, because the less distance between the pair of them, the more normal things felt, as though Arthur was no longer trying to avoid him, or that whatever had been going on with him might be passing or…

Arthur's hand coming up suddenly, slowly, to cup Merlin's cheek, jolted him out of his thoughts, the warm, unsure way he did it sending something a flutter inside of Merlin's stomach, his mind playing catch-up with the way his breath hitched, the way his heart seemed to be galloping now, thudding in his ears as Arthur mumbled something, making it almost hard to hear.

"_You've_ done nothing wrong… except make me fall in love with you. And as a king…" He shook his head, biting his lip, though he kept his eyes trained on Merlin's, the breath between them stilling with the confession Merlin had never imagined he would hear from Arthur. "I'm not supposed to love my servant, Merlin. Surely you must know that?" He asked, his voice low and apologetic, eyes swimming with the same emotion, with pain and hurt, and Merlin would have sworn, in that moment, he felt Arthur's heart breaking right along with his own. Because that was almost the worst thing in the world he could say right now.

"And you—" Merlin took in a shaky breath, trying to keep himself calm, unsure if this was a confession or… a rejection. Was he _rejecting_ Merlin? Though Merlin hadn't offered himself—not in so many words—it still felt like… felt like Arthur was telling him he couldn't be with him, that he wanted to, but simply could not. "—are just now realizing this? That you… love me? That you can't be with me?" Merlin asked slowly.

"I've been thinking about it," Arthur shook his head. "For… longer than you can imagine, but…"

"But you've just recently come to the conclusion that we can't be together because of our statuses." Merlin finished for him, nodding in defeat as he turned away from Arthur, shrugging off his touch.

He didn't know that he had expected anything different, to be perfectly honest, but, knowing, without a doubt now, that this was something that bothered Arthur, that their standings in life truly _did_ mean something, on some level...

"Do you love me?" Arthur asked suddenly, his hand coming up once again, fluttering just in front of Merlin's face, his fingers burning Merlin's skin without even touching him.

"Do you even need to ask?" Merlin mumbled, turning back to look at Arthur. "Of course I do. But… you said so yourself, we can't—"

Arthur smiled then, a soft, careful thing before his hand came to rest against Merlin's face one again, thumb stroking his cheek just under his eye before he leaned forward and caught Merlin's lips, tentative and careful and the sweetest thing Merlin had known in all his life.

Merlin let out a breath through his nose, eyes closing as he leaned into Arthur, barely allowing himself to hope this would be the start of something else, something new and amazing—because, even if it wasn't, this kiss was amazing enough that he couldn't care for the moment, just for the moment.

Until the moment passed, and Arthur was pulling away—slowly, carefully—still stroking Merlin's cheek as he did so, and Merlin was left with a feeling of dread, wondering if Arthur had done that and would now proceed to tell Merlin that it could never happen again, that it was a mistake, that he was the king and Merlin was the servant and that was all there would ever be to it. He wasn't sure if the kiss was meant to be a cruelty or a kindness…

"I've been trying so hard lately," Arthur mumbled, eyes still on Merlin's. "To put some distance between us, to push you away, to keep things… the same. Because it's not… my council… they've told me before they don't approve—and my father certainly wouldn't—and I've been trying to run my kingdom, run my life, in a way that would have made him proud, but… I couldn't even sleep tonight—not with you so… _close_. Closer than you've really been to me in days now." He explained, chuckling bitterly at himself, leaving Merlin the moment to turn it all over in his head, allow everything to click itself into place, things beginning to make sense now. Of course that was what had been happening.

"I would tell you to get some sleep _now_, but…" Merlin shook his head, looking away from Arthur, for what felt like the first time in ages, to the sky above them, the first glimpses of daylight peeking their way around the trees, before turning back to him. "It's dawn. The knights will be waking soon and then we'll need to get going. So I guess you'll just have to be—"

The rest of Merlin's sentence, his teasing, was cut off, falling onto the edge of Arthur's lips instead of the air between them, when the king leaned forward and caught Merlin in another kiss, making his head spin when he pulled back much too soon.

"I know I said I can't be in love with my servant, so…" Arthur began again, letting out a long, slow, almost thoughtful sort of breath. "If I sack you, will you object?" He asked, his tone teasing in a familiar sort of way.

"You're not sacking me, you idiot." Merlin said, rolling his eyes even as a smile tugged its way into place.

"No, I'm not." Arthur nodded in agreement. "My council will just have to get used to the idea, I suppose, because I—"

"Oh why don't the pair of you just shut up already?"

Merlin whipped his head around in the same instant as Arthur did, eyes scanning the area, falling instantly on the knights—on the _half-awake_ knights—staring at them, looking miffed and aggravated and oh God, like they'd heard _everything_.

Merlin blushed as he felt Arthur's hand fall from his face, saw him straighten himself up, out of the corner of his eye, cleared his throat, coming to the same realization that Merlin had. Well wasn't that just _brilliant? _

"We get it, you love each other, it's not news to any one of us," Gwaine said, cutting his eyes from the other knights, from Elyan and Leon and Percival and the other odd knights who happened to be traveling with them, to Merlin, to Arthur. "Couldn't you have picked a better time to discuss this? Perhaps a time when Camelot's finest knights weren't trying to sleep?" He asked pointedly, gesturing between himself and the others.

"Erm, sorry." Merlin said, shrugging sheepishly and glancing from Gwaine to Arthur.

Well, he _was_ rather sorry. Sorry they'd woken them, sorry they'd overheard, but not sorry that he and Arthur had… Well…

"I can't say that _I_ am." Arthur said then, grinning as he turned from the knights to Merlin and leaned towards him slowly, catching his lips once again in an agonizingly sweet and slow sort of way, the knights groaning as Merlin smiled against his lips, leaning into him for the moment.

"I'll tell my council they'll just have to get used to this—just as the knights will—when we get back to Camelot. I _am_ the king, after all." Arthur murmured the second they pulled apart, his words soft and only for Merlin's ears as the knights, all a bit disgruntled at having been awoken early, seemed to reluctantly pull themselves to their feet and wake themselves up the rest of the way.

Merlin could do little more than nod at him, leaning in to him to kiss him once again. He had a feeling it might not be so simple—that the council might not be as accepting as the knights were—not as good-natured about the whole thing, either—but... Arthur _was_ the king, as he'd said, and if he wanted to fall in love with his manservant...

Wasn't he allowed to?

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End file.
